Info

T. Griffin is a songwriter, composer and producer based in Brooklyn New York. He has composed music for over 40 feature films and dozens of live multidisciplinary projects. He was one of six composers selected as a fellow at the Sundance Composer's lab in 2008 and has been nominated twice for CinemaEye Honors for original music score.

News

Quest

Ten years in the making, 2018 Sundance Sensation QUEST opened the season for PBS' POV series.

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Life, Animated Nominated for an Academy Award

Life, Animated has been nominated for a 2017 Best Documentary Oscar!

SUNDANCE 2017

Jon Olshevsky's QUEST premiered at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival in the Documentary Competition.

Life, Animated

Life, Animated: Academy Award winning director Roger Ross Williams premiered Life, Animated in Documentary Competition at Sundance 2016 and was awarded the Best Director prize. Called "Incredibly moving" by The Guardian, the film features animation by MacGuff and a super-saturated electronic score co-composed by T. Griffin and Dylan Stark. The film has gone on to play at True/False, Miami, Full Frame, Tribeca, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Sheffield, Sundance London, Montclair and Nantucket film festivals, opening or closing many of them. Theatrical release via The Orchard, broadcasting on A & E.

Burt Reynolds Documentary at SXSW

Jesse Moss, the director of 2014 Sundance sensation "The Overnighters" premiered his documentary about Burt Reynolds, Hal Needham and the making of "Smokey and the Bandit" at the South By Southwest Film Festival this March. T. Griffin provides the "disco-porno-country" score. Broadcast will be on CMT in 2016.

Solitary

Kristi Jacobson's film Solitary is a document of her unprecedented access to Red Onion Supermax prison, where all the inmates are in Solitary confinement, many for years, or even decades at a time. T. Griffin's eerie, percussive score was created from recordings of circular saw blades, bowed vibraphone and manipulated recordings of Red Onion itself. Solitary premiered at Tribeca Film Festival and will be broadcast on HBO in 2016.

The Measure of all Things

T. Griffin, Brendan Canty (Fugazi) and Catherine McRae have collaborated on a live score to Academy Award Nominee Sam Green's presentation about the Guinness Book of World Records: The Measure of all Things. It premiered at Hot Docs Film Festival in Toronto, April 27th, 2014 and has since performed all over the world, from Warsaw to Bentonville. On August 26th it was featured at the David Byrne curated MeltDown festival in London.

WELCOME TO LEITH Score Release

The score for Michael Beach Nichols and Christopher Walker's WELCOME TO LEITH is out!

EVOLUTION OF A CRIMINAL Score Release

The score for the Darius Clark Monroe's Spike Lee-produced film EVOLUTION OF A CRIMINAL is out now! Available in our shop, or on iTunes now!

We Have an Anchor in London and Paris

We Have an Anchor plays London's Barbican and Paris' Sonic Protest festival March 31st and April 2nd and 3rd. This live film/music event directed by Jem Cohen features original music performed live by a band made up of T. Griffin, Guy Picciotto (Fugazi), Jim White (Dirty Three), Jessica Moss (Thee Silver Mt. Zion) and Efrim Menuck and Sophie Trudeau (Godspeed You! Black Emperor) with guest vocals by Mira Bilotte (White Magic). Here's what the New York Times had to say when it was presented in New York as a part of the BAM Next Wave Festival in September of 2013.

THE OVERNIGHTERS Score Release

The score for Jesse Moss' staggering Oscar-shortlisted documentary is out now! Available in our shop, or on iTunes now!

Streaming now on Netflix

The Overnighters, Evolution of a Criminal, E-TEAM and Vessel are all currently streaming on Netflix.

Three Films to screen at Full Frame 2015

Three films with T. Griffin scores will premiere at the Full Frame Film Festival in North Carolina this April. TOCANDO LA LUZ (TOUCH THE LIGHT) and HERE COME THE VIDEOFREEX will receive their world premieres and KINGDOM OF SHADOWS will screen.

KINGDOM OF SHADOWS premieres at SXSW 2015

KINGDOM OF SHADOWS, Bernardo Ruiz' intimate look at three lives touched by the drug trade on both sides of the Texas / Mexico border will receive its world premiere at the South By Southwest Film Festival this march.

WELCOME TO LEITH at Sundance 2015

Welcome to Leith premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in the Documentary Competition. Rolling Stone called it "one of the 10 best things we saw at Sundance", and it got a glowing mention in the New York Times' wrap-up as well. The nightmarish score features playing by Brendan Canty (Fugazi), downtown reed phenomenon Matt Bauder and the amazing experimental electronic artist, Tim Hecker. Look for it to terrify audiences near you soon!

E-TEAM Score Release

The score for the Sundance Award-Winning film by Katy Chevigny and Ross Kauffman is out! Available in our shop now!

October Openings

THREE films with T. Griffin scores opened this October, and all three of them played New York's IFC Center. The Overnighters, Evolution of a Criminal and E-TEAM continue their theatrical barnstorming all fall.

Captivated: The Pamela Smart Story

Jeremiah Zagar's look at the media circus surrounding Pamela Smart's murder trial premiered at Sundance and is currently playing on HBO. T. Griffin composed music for several scenes, alongside Zoe Keating and Johann Johannson.

The Newburgh Sting

Kate Davis and David Heilbroner's expose of an FBI terrorism sting in Newburgh, NY is in rotation on HBO.

Evolution of a Criminal

Darius Clark Monroe's meditation on his incarceration at age 16 for robbing a Texas bank premiered at South By Southwest 2014, and took home the Grand Jury Prize at the Full Frame Film Festival. Executive Produced by Spike Lee, look for this film in theaters later in the year!

Sundance 2014

T. Griffin composed scores for TWO of the 16 films that premiered in the Documentary competition of the 2014 Sundance Film Festival. E-TEAM and The Overnighters premiered in Park City Utah to rave reviews. The Overnighters took home a special jury prize in the Documentary Competition, and E-Team was awarded the cinematography prize. Here are a few of the reviews, so far:
For The Overnighters
Variety The Hollywood Reporter"The score by Brooklyn musician T. Griffin is highly atmospheric, blending sounds that fit the region - guitar, banjo, harmonica - with somber electronics that reflect the darker veins being explored in this boomtown chronicle." - Hollywood Reporter
For E-TEAM
Variety "David Teague's editing is tight as a drum, while T. Griffin's pulse-pounding music keeps the audience in the action." - Variety
The Hollywood Reporter "E-Team packs editorial punch in no small part to editor David Teague's powerful, swift calibrations, as well as T. Griffin's percussive score." - Hollywood Reporter

Two Live Soundtracks

We Have an Anchor was presented in New York as a part of the BAM Next Wave Festival for three nights in September of 2013. This live film/music event directed by Jem Cohen features original music performed live by a band made up of T. Griffin, Guy Picciotto (Fugazi), Jim White (Dirty Three), Jessica Moss (Thee Silver Mt. Zion) and Efrim Menuck and Sophie Trudeau (Godspeed You! Black Emperor) with guest vocals by Mira Bilotte (White Magic). Here's what the New York Times had to say.
A Love Letter to the Fog will be presented in San Francisco at the Exploratorium October 2nd and 3rd. This live documentary directed by Sam Green, academy-award nominated director of The Weather Underground features an original score performed live by T. Griffin and Catherine McRae from The Quavers, Brendan Canty (Fugazi), and Matt Bauder (Sway Machinery)

Informant, by Jamie Meltzer opened theatrically in New York and LA and on iTunes September 13th. It was the top documentary on iTunes for two weeks running. For a complete list of theaters see Music Box Films

The score for The Education of Mohammad Hussein, by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady (Jesus Camp, Detropia) is available now in our shop and on iTunes.

California Solo is available now on DVD and VOD. Find it: www.californiasolo.com.

INFORMANT won the Grand Jury prize at the DocNYC festival.
The Quavers, T. Griffin's band project with Dennis Cronin and Catherine McRae, have released a new album FELL ASLEEP ON A TRAIN. Preview and buy it now at thequavers.com. The New Yorker calls it "Brooding and beautiful", Time Out NY calls it "more than worth the wait".
Catherine McRae, T. Griffin and Sam Green joined San Francisco's phenomenon, Pop Up Magazine, to present a short film/music/essay piece on fog to 3000 people at Davies Symphony Hall. An expanded version of the piece will be presented at NYC's River to River festival on June 20th. Brendan Canty (Fugazi) and Matt Bauder will join the band.
The soundtrack album for California Solo, starring Robert Carlyle is available now on iTunes. It features T. Griffin's score, as well as the title song by Swervedriver's Adam Franklin, sung by Franklin, and again by Carlyle himself. California Solo opened in New York on Nov. 30, and LA on Dec 7 via Strand Releasing.
Dragonslayer is screening on Showtime.
The Education of Mohammed Hussein, a film by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady featuring a score by T. Griffin has been shortlisted for an oscar nomination. It will be broadcast on HBO later this year.
La Camioneta got the kind of Variety Review that every director dreams of.
Informant, Jamie Meltzer's Doc about FBI informant Brandon Darby premiered at the San Francisco International Film Festival 04/22/2012! The excellent Variety Review singled out the original music as a “notable plus.” Informant will be featured at IDFA and the DocNYC festival.
Sam Green's video installation about Buckminster Fuller at SF MoMA featured original music composed and recorded for the project by T. Griffin. It ran March through July 2012.
After a theatrical run and excellent reviews Liza Johnson's debut feature Return is available on VOD, including iTunes. It stars Linda Cardelini and Michael Shannon. Says Time Out New York: “this is what independent cinema should be.”
T. Griffin received his second Cinema Eye Award nomination for Original Score in as many years for Dragonslayer. in 2011, he was nominated for Utopia in Four Movements.